First, before I get onto the reflective part of my post, go check out this new worship CD. I never recommend worship CDs anymore…but this one is rocking my face off, especially Paslm 68.  Isaac Watts’ words +Celtic flavoring + men’s choir in unison + 6/8 time signature = SCRIPTURAL AWESOMENESS!

Second, I had two very conversations with two very good friends…two men I esteem for nearly identical reasons.  They are both wise beyond their years and both are younger than I.  Both I think have my good at heart and neither are afraid to speak bold truth.  As Proverbs 27:6 says, “Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy.”  I know this is a terribly “evangelical” thing to do…but if any verse is my “life-verse”, it’s this one.

I discovered that I cut people off. Anyone who’s talked to me for longer than 30 seconds knows this…but it’s finally on my radar.  This cutting people off doesn’t show that I care about what people say…and I haven’t, always.  But I do now.

I discovered that I do a lousy job at treating well the people I love.  One of the friends pointed this out about himself and it struck me how I’m exactly the same way.  By God’s grace, I will be able to love people in truth and deed, thus enhancing my ethos, as we’re learning in Preparation and Delivery of Sermons. (See? I’m already getting my money’s worth.)

But even more than getting my money’s worth at school in just the first two days, God is already shaping me in ways that I haven’t been shaped before.  And now that the Gospel has taken root, I’m not assembling a laundry list of what I need to be striving to do…instead, I’m seeing that loving my neighbor by listening is a good work I can indeed delight in doing because of the Gospel.

These two friends are two of the most driven individuals I’ve ever met…and probably two of the brightest minds I’ll ever have the privilege of calling ‘friend.’  But I thank God for them both and remember them both in my prayers.